JCL roundtable: South Asian atherosclerotic risk

South Asian risk for atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) has received special emphasis in the 2018 US AHA/ACC/Multisociety Cholesterol Guidelines. The term "South Asian" refers specifically to the countries of India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives and to the worldwide diaspora of families from these countries. With this definition, approximately 25% of the world's population is South Asian, but about 50% of ASCVD occurs in this group. In this JCL Roundtable, we discuss the roles of visceral adiposity, diabetes, and features of the metabolic syndrome; lipoprotein(a); and diet and lifestyle, including the transition of both diet and lifestyle over the past 40 to 50 years. Genetic and/or hidden risk is an area of ongoing research. Individual patient assessment and intervention should recognize the earlier onset of ASCVD and the value of screening for traditional risk factors as well as waist circumference, coronary artery calcium scoring, and lipoprotein(a) assay. Culturally acceptable dietary strategies are available, although not widely implemented or evaluated as yet. In very-high-risk cases of secondary prevention, one should consider combining medications to drive low-density lipoprotein cholesterol much lower than 70 mg/dL. Our discussion concludes by insisting that the signal of alarm must be accompanied by decisive action.